


Just Pretend

by lantadyme



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-19
Updated: 2011-02-19
Packaged: 2017-10-15 18:31:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/163663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lantadyme/pseuds/lantadyme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was sure she was dead, so it only makes sense that hearing from her again would shake him up a little.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Pretend

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to SkaianRedeemer for suggesting I add on a better ending.

The second half of the headache is always worse than the first. The first half is all build-up, fire throbbing and pulsing and aching through his skull, but that Sollux can handle. It's the second half that always breaks him, when it feels like his skull is about to cleave in two and then his eyes go wrong; they see in red and blue respectively and bleed a gradient of purple through his line of sight. The colors nauseate him. He can barely even open his eyes. He curls up on his floor clutching his stomach and prays to every prophet imaginable that it will end soon.

He's kind of irritable like this.

Friends start pinging his damn computer and every little note it sings only makes his head pound harder, louder, the pain near deafening except for that pinging noise. They each have their own sound and _he knows who's accosting him like this_ —there will be hell to pay when the purple fades from his vision and he gets over this migraine. You will suffer, KK. You will suffer.

But then a different noise pings and that can't be right, _that can't be right_ , it's utterly fucking impossible because—

Because she's dead.

He killed her.

His head spins, his vision swimming with violet and maroon, and he can feel his stomach turning over and over like a flopping fish but he pushes his palms into the carpet and crawls over to his computer anyway.

The pounding in his skull ratchets up the agony the farther from the floor he is. Leaning against his computer desk he rests his forehead on the chair, breathing and his mind racing. Because this is impossible. There's no way this is happening. It has to be a trick; some grubfucker he knows from his hacking forums has broken down his firewalls and changed someone's ping MP3. That's what it is. He will end that asshole when he finds out who it is.

Except it sings quietly out of his speakers again and Sollux swallows down around his nausea and hauls himself up into his computer chair. It feels like he weighs a thousand million mass-units when his head is splitting like this. He sits there with his stomach churning and he reaches for the mouse.

Because what if it really is her?

All the lights in the room are off and as he kills the plain black screensaver the sudden colors of the monitor lance into his eyes like daggers. The light makes everything worse, makes the nausea and the pounding and spinning loud like rocket engines in his ears. Sollux fights to keep the lack-of-anything in his stomach down.

But when he looks through his purple-smeared vision, squinting in the head-splitting monitor glow, he doesn't see someone else's screen name. He doesn't see someone else's text color. Even with the purple in his eyes, he knows that color. He knows it. And it's the surprise more than anything that shatters his control and ends in him puking into the trash can next to his desk.

Throwing up is the worst. It leaves him feeling disgusting and exhausted and every heave only makes his head throb harder. He's crying when he finally stops, and he's not sure if it's from the pain or the utter shock of seeing her words again, but he wipes pitifully at his mouth and his eyes and he reaches for the keyboard.

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] began trolling twinArmageddons [TA] \-- 

AA: s0llux  
AA: n0 need t0 hurry  
AA: im 0kay with waiting  
AA: take y0ur time   
TA: aradiia?   
AA: ah there y0u are   
TA: oh my god, youre aliive??  
TA: where did you go?  
TA: ii looked everywhere for you.  
TA: iive taken that 2tupiid long a22 triip out two your hiive liike 2iix tiime2 2earchiing under every 2tone for you.  
TA: where have you been?   
AA: i needed s0me time t0 myself  
AA: and y0u w0uldnt have f0und me anyway   
TA: what, were you hiidiing your2elf underground agaiin or 2ome 2hiit?  
TA: fuck, ii dont even care, aradiia.  
TA: are you okay? do you need anythiing?    
AA: n0  
AA: im 0kay  
AA: im 0kay with a l0t 0f things n0w  
AA: alth0ugh it 0ccurs t0 me thats n0t exactly what y0u mean with that questi0n   
TA: what2 that 2uppo2ed two mean?   
AA: y0u are asking if im hurt 0r s0mething   
TA: of cour2e iim a2kiing that.  
TA: ii  
TA: 2hiit.  
TA: diid you 2ee what happened? when your hiive and everythiing exploded?   
AA: 0f c0urse s0llux  
AA: i was there   
TA: oh.  
TA: 2hiit aradiia.  
TA: iit wa2nt me, okay? ii dont even remember how ii got 2o far from my hiive.  
TA: iit wa2 the 2tupiid fuckiing miind honey.  
TA: ii dont even know how ii got iit iin my mouth.    
AA: s0llux   
TA: ii would never hurt you on purpo2e.  
TA: plea2e beliieve me?  
TA: 2hiit, thii2 miigraiine ju2t  
TA: you have no iidea how much ii fuckiing de2pii2e my2elf for beiing 2uch an iintegral piiece of 2erket2 plan two murder you.  
TA: ii helped tz wiith 2ome 2hiity revenge plot that ii gue22 worked becau2e 2he2 fuckiing armle22 now and lackiing 2even eye2.  
TA: iit doe2nt even begiin two make me any le22 guiilty, though.   
AA: s0llux st0p   
TA: youre probably endle22ly pii22ed at me and ii under2tand.  
TA: fuck, how can ii even po22iibly begiin two apologiize for 2omethiing liike thii2?   
AA: st0p typing   
TA: okay, iill 2hut up for a 2econd 2iince iim only 2oundiing more pathetiic wiith each liine.   
AA: i didnt message y0u s0 y0u c0uld ap0l0gize  
AA: i d0nt blame y0u   
TA: you dont?   
AA: n0  
AA: i hear the v0ices better like this and they t0ld me the truth behind what happened  
AA: im 0kay with what happened s0llux  
AA: i think i sh0uldnt be but i am 0kay with it   
TA: waiit, 2o youre diifferent now? ii2 that what youre 2ayiing?   
AA: i supp0se i am a bit different  
AA: but i messaged y0u because y0u need t0 kn0w im 0kay  
AA: i kn0w h0w y0u are  
AA: y0u tend t0 beat y0urself up f0r things y0u sh0uldnt  
AA: and if y0u keep m0ping s0me things that sh0uld happen might n0t   
TA: what?  
TA: thii2 ii2 a 2hiity hollow pep talk?   
AA: yes   
TA: ii fuckiing kiilled you aradiia. week2 ago.  
TA: or diidnt apparently 2iince were talkiing riight now.  
TA: you diidnt talk two me for niights and now you 2uddenly pop iin out of 2omewhere 2pooky and my2tiical and tell me to 2uck iit up and 2top 2ulkiing?   
AA: y0ure angry  
AA: i can alm0st remember anger   
TA: ii dont under2tand, aradiia.    
AA: i kn0w s0llux  
AA: i d0nt have time t0 explain n0w th0ugh   
TA: waiit.  
TA: 2hiit, dont ju2t dii2appear agaiin.   
AA: im s0rry i have t0 g0   
TA: can ii come 2ee you??   
AA: n0 s0llux  
AA: g00dbye

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA] \--

TA: aradiia waiit!  
TA: 2hiit!!

The pain in his head hasn't ebbed any, pounding with hot agony, and Sollux is shaking as he leans back in his chair and keeps staring at the screen. It hurts. The light rips straight through his eyes into the back of his skull and he can't stop crying. He doesn't have the energy to sob but the tears trace down his face in honey rivulets and his hands tremble from more than just the pain.

She's alive?

Even now, even having spoken to her, he struggles to believe it. It's some trick of the migraine. It's absolute insanity because he's never even seen Aradia angry before, but not having her livid and spouting murderous spite at him has his mind spinning with confusion. She had trusted him and he'd brutally murdered her. She should want him dead; suffering and impaled in a puddle of his ugly mustard blood with her standing over him as he begs her to just end it all. That makes sense to him. Pain and black loathing are a familiar daily routine for Sollux.

He hates himself _so much_ for her death, and she isn't even the slightest bit annoyed? The puzzle pieces fit together wrong and the air hitches in his throat, the first little hiccup of his emotional turmoil, and he swallows that down and looks away.

Maybe what he hates the most is that he's furious with her for it—for not hating him. He is intensely fucking pissed, snarling and raging and the pull of those facial muscles only making his head throb harder. No one is blaming him for her death and somewhere deep inside he needs someone to. He needs someone to hate him with all the boiling black rage they can muster, if only so he can stop doing it himself and finally move on.

Karkat pings him again and Sollux growls, his hands curved into claws on his desk as he stands up and flips it viciously over onto his floor, monitor and papers and grubs shattering and spilling everywhere.

\---

It takes an hour for the migraine to fade. He spends it curled on his floor shaking and by the time the last of the lavender has left his vision, Sollux isn't nearly as angry anymore. Now he's upset with himself for being so callous and it reminds him so much of his retarded conversations with Karkat that he wants to kick himself. Idiot. At least she'd left before he'd blown up at her in blind rage. Doesn't make him feel any better about it, though.

He's always ravenous when the headaches end. He stuffs his face with dried meat and chips and sugary pink cola, rubbing at his eyes as the last of the red and blue fades out of his vision. He feels like the bottom of a municipal drainage ditch and when he finally flicks his lights back on and stares at the mess of computer parts he'd dumped all over his floor, he doesn't have the energy to be pissed at himself.

Whatever. It's done. Might as well clean it up and get it over with.

The monitor is more or less fine but his speakers are ruined and that's annoying. He'd gone to a lot of trouble to steal them from an asshole neighbor of his on the twentieth floor. Sollux sets them both aside for later when he can find his soldering kit and maybe fix whatever circuit break has shorted them out. He hooks the monitor back up to his computer tower and there are Karkat's chat windows on the screen, five of them because of course that stupid bulgestain would pick now to throw a shitty virus Sollux' way. Moron. He wants to be mad but he can't be because at least all that angry grey capslock has covered up Aradia's window.

The one he knows he'll never be able to make himself close.

He finishes picking up his room and then stands in the middle of it. Weighing options. Because he could answer Karkat and argue with him for an hour and eventually get the idiot to talk him out of the insane thing he's planning. He could do that. God knows he's talked Karkat out of more than a few extremely dumb ideas and he could throw mister grey text a bone with this one and let him even out the odds.

Or he could just go see her.

It would be faster and easier. Maybe not smarter, but Sollux is the smart guy. He's smart all the time. He figures he's due for a really fantastically stupid decision and he might as well make it this. It's not like he's going to get horribly murdered or anything.

He digs a husktop out of a pile of stuff and clips a carrying strap to it. And yeah, he should probably not do this. She told him not to go see her. But he leaves his block anyway and takes the elevator down thirty-five floors to the street.

It takes a lot of energy to fly himself all the miles out there. She'd been happy to live in the country near her caves so she could dress up in her silly explorer's outfits and get them all grimy with cave mud as she wandered through them with wide, fascinated eyes. Sollux had never really understood that about her, the need to get out and look at things, the ability to see beauty in the oddities of nature. Aradia had always told him it was because he was an oddity himself (although Sollux prefers the term 'cracked-out bifurcated monstrosity'). Maybe that had been why she'd liked him. He doesn't know.

He's tired and a bit winded as he finally catches a glimpse of the crater that used to be her hive. From the air it looks like a bomb went off, the ground still blackened by curling energies even after all these weeks. The crater itself is yards deep, shards of shattered metal and building materials thrown everywhere for at least a mile. He always expects it to be smoking, but it's not.

(In his memory it's always smoking and there's red blood all over his clothes.)

His bicolored sneakers sink into the ash, sending rocks tumbling, and Sollux feels so small standing in the middle of all this apocalyptic devastation. _He_ did this. He destroyed everything. He'd never really grasped how powerful he is until he'd woken up from his mind honey trance and seen the havoc his fucked-up brain dynamics had funneled through his eyes—enough psychic energy to decimate an entire hive. Probably a lot more than just one hive.

More than enough to vaporize one low-blooded troll girl.

"Aradia?" he calls, and even now he can't raise his voice over a hushed whisper. It feels like trespassing. She'd told him not to come.

The husktop slung at his side pings with her note and Sollux freezes. A message from a ghost. It sends a feeling of cold dread down his spine and he has to make himself take shorts steps over to a displaced boulder and set the computer down on top of it.

\-- apocalypseArisen [AA] began trolling twinArmageddons [TA] \-- 

AA: s0meh0w i knew y0u w0uldnt listen   
TA: well 2orry iif ii havent 2een you iin age2. that2 only half my fault, you know.   
AA: i th0ught y0u blamed y0urself entirely  
AA: y0u were rather explicit ab0ut it   
TA: yeah, well you know how fuckiing pathetiic ii am when iim iin the miiddle of a miigraiine.  
TA: iid blame myself for every a22hole 2piirit that 2iing2 hii2 comiing doom iin my head at that poiint.  
TA: iignore that, though. where are you? let me 2ee you.   
AA: y0u cant see me s0llux   
TA: ii under2tand that youre 2tiill pii22ed wiith me. ii dont really expect you two not want two riip my throat out or 2ome 2hiit liike that.  
TA: ju2t let me 2ee you 2o ii know youre okay, aradiia. ii promii2e ii wont even touch you.   
AA: i already told y0u im n0t angry  
AA: i d0nt really remember h0w t0 be angry  
AA: but y0u cant see me    
TA: 2hiit, are you goiing two make me crawl on my 2tomach and beg?  
TA: fiine, fiine, whatever. ii de2erve iit.  
TA: plea2e, aradiia, let me 2ee you.  
TA: iive been 2eriiou2ly fucked up 2iince ii realiized you were dead and ii hone2tly need two know youre aliive and not 2ome criippled ma22 of bleediing grubmeat 2ta2hed underground 2omewhere.  
TA: ii know that 2ound2 liike a22hole 2arca2tiic giibberii2h, but for once iit2 actually not.  
TA: plea2e let me 2ee you.   
AA: s0llux  
AA: fine i will c0me up  
AA: i d0nt think y0u will see me th0ugh   
TA: give me 2ome crediit. iim not bliind yet.    
AA: l00k t0 y0ur left   
TA: are you 2eriiou2? iim fuckiing lookiing 2traiight on iin that diirec

And then he sees it. He fucking sees it—an amorphous blob of _something_ floating just footsteps from where he stands. It's off-red and terrifyingly eerie, tendrils of ectoplasmic goo spiraling off in blobs and dissolving straight into the air. For a mind-numbing second Sollux forgets to breathe. For a second he stands there with terrified icy spider's feet running up and down his spine. A cold sweat breaks out over his entire body and he wants nothing more in the world than to run as fast as he can in the other direction, get away from it, put distance between himself and it because he can _taste_ the pure concentration of raw apocalypse emanating from it.

From Aradia.

His hands tremble, still perched prim over the keyboard. He swallows hard around the sour paranoid fear rising up from his stomach, and Sollux sets two shaking fingers against his glasses and pulls them aside. He stares wide-eyed in horrified rapture, feeling the deep psychic hollowness washing out of it like an ocean, and when he finally remembers to breathe again the only words he can manage are squeaking sounds.

 _Ghost_ , he wants to say, but all he can think is _demon._

She vanishes into thin air, her presence evaporating from his psionic vision, and in that second of gaping reality he slams the husktop's lid closed and tears off into the sky as fast as his powers can carry him.

\---

Later:

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] began trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG] \-- 

TA: fuck.  
TA: kk.  
TA: damn iit, kk, would you an2wer me??  
TA: ii really need 2omeone to conviince me ii havent 2tepped off the deep end.  
TA: ii 2eriiou2ly feel liike iive taken a 2pectacular jump off the fuckiing hiighboard and am currently 2wiimmiing iin a 2ea of 2hiitty my2tiical voodoo crap and iit ii2 2cariing the hell out of me.  
TA: ii 2wear there are riipper2harks iin here tryiing to eat me, man.  
TA: me and thii2 worthle22 unraveliing metaphor.   
CG: WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT?   
TA: oh god, there you are.   
CG: ARE YOU ON FUCKING DRUGS?  
CG: HOW HIGH DO YOU HAVE TO BE TO FILL MY FUCKING CHAT WINDOW WITH THIS SHIT?  
CG: I GET ENOUGH OF THIS BULLSHIT WITH THAT CLOWN FUCKER WHO WON'T STOP YAPPING HIS GODAWFUL GAPING PROTEIN CHUTE AT ME.  
CG: YOU KEEP THIS UP AND I WILL DROP YOU LIKE A HOT STEAMING LOAD OF HOOFBEAST MANURE AS A BEST FRIEND.   
TA: fuck, kk, lii2ten two me for a 2econd you bulgefiiend.   
CG: YOU BABBLE INCOHERENT SHIT ABOUT MIRACLES AND I WILL CLOSE THIS WINDOW SO FUCKING FAST IT WILL MAKE YOUR BIFURCATED HEAD SPIN.   
TA: 2hut up or ii wiill go talk two your freaky a22 giirlfriiend iin2tead.  
TA: ii am that fuckiing de2perate, dude.   
CG: FUCK, DON'T TALK TO HER. THAT'S JUST CREEPY. YOU DON'T EVEN LIKE HER.   
TA: ii dont dii2liike her, 2he2 ju2t a p2ycho biitch nutjob who liike2 two iinvade my per2onal 2pace and liick my glasses whiile iim 2tiill weariing them.   
CG: DID SHE ACTUALLY DO THAT?   
TA: ye2, why would ii liie about 2omethiing a2 fucked up a2 that?  
TA: but that2 not the poiint, lii2ten two me you giigantiic a22hole!   
CG: OKAY, FUCK.   
TA: aa'2 not dead.   
CG: LIKE FUCK SHE'S NOT.  
CG: I DON'T CARE WHAT YOUR RETARDED DOOM PROPHET BULLSHIT DREAMS TELL YOU, ARADIA'S SOMEONE'S FUTURE LUSUS' SHITPILE BY NOW.   
TA: god, that ii2 a hiideou2 iimage, kk.  
TA: iit ii2 actually kiind of up2etting me. ii am 2uch a huge pan2y riight now.  
TA: but anyway, 2he me22aged me a couple of hour2 ago and ii went out there two 2ee her.   
CG: SHE DID NOT YOU FUCKING WASTE OF AIR.  
CG: YOU SAID YOU HAD HER PATHETIC WEAKSLIME RED BLOOD ALL OVER YOUR HANDS SO HOW COULD SHE POSSIBLY BE ALIVE?   
TA: 2he2 not dead but 2he kind of ii2.  
TA: 2hiit, maybe iim fiinally crazy. took me long enough.  
TA: ii 2aw thii2 2pooky red gho2t thiing floatiing out there by her hiive.  
TA: iit 2cared me half iintwo my fuckiing deathcave but ii 2wear iit wa2 her.  
TA: ii would 2take my liife on iit.   
CG: WELL IF YOU'RE SO DAMN CONVINCED, WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO, FUCKASS?  
CG: OH THAT KARKAT, HE THINKS HIMSELF INTO FUCKING ASS BACKWARD IDIOCY LOOPS ALL THE GODDAMN TIME, MIGHT AS WELL GO ASK THAT MORONIC DOUCHEBAG TO TWIST MY CRIPPLING MIGRAINE THINKSPONGE INTO BELIEVING I'M NOT SUCH A FUCKING RETARD.  
CG: YOU SEE SPOOKY SHIT ALL THE TIME, SOLLUX.  
CG: WHY ARE YOU FLIPPING YOUR LID THIS TIME AND NOT EVERY OTHER TIME?   
TA: ii dont know, man. iit wa2 her.   
CG: OH GODDAMNIT! IT WAS NOT HER! SHE'S DEAD, AND EVEN IF YOU DID SEE HER GHOST, WHO GIVES A FUCK?  
CG: HERE'S A HINT, ASSWIPE: _NOT ME!!!!!_   
TA: god, you are the wor2t friiend, vanta2.    
CG: ALL I HEAR IS A NOOKSUCKING YELLOW-BLOOD BITCHING WITH HIS DEFORMED TONGUE, SPRAYING SALIVA ALL OVER HIS FUCKING MONITOR.  
CG: IT WASN'T HER.  
CG: YOU NEED ME TO SAY IT AGAIN?  
CG: IT WASN'T FUCKING HER.  
CG: DUMPASS.  
CG: NOW GO SIT WITH YOUR WORTHLESS MORONIC LUSUS AND TRY TO ABSORB SOME OF HIS CRIPPLING STUPIDITY UNTIL YOU BELIEVE ME.   
TA: ii mu2t be pa2t the poiint of no return becau2e iim actually con2iideriing thii2 fuckiing retarded 2uggestiion.   
CG: YOU CAME TO ME, DIPSHIT. WHAT ELSE DO YOU WANT?   
TA: ii dont know.  
TA: ju2t 2hut up and go back two cyberiing 2hiitty roleplay dragon bucket2 wiith tz.   
CG: AUGH, WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT YOU SICK FUCK?  
CG: NOW I HAVE THIS DISTURBING PICTURE IN MY HEAD THAT I'M NOT EVEN GOING TO DESCRIBE TO YOU, IT'S THAT FUCKING OBSCENE.   
TA: eheheheh, 2erve2 you riight, a22hole.  
TA: iim goiing up2taiir2.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] ceased trolling carcinoGeneticist [CG]  \-- 

He signs off with a tiny smile on his face and it feels like forever since he's smiled. Since he woke up outside Aradia's hive almost. Karkat is a seething pile of profanity but Sollux knows better than to take it to heart, and even if his advice is the most fucking backward suggestion ever, it's better than what Sollux has been doing. He'd spent the whole trip back to his hive freaking out and by the time he'd opened his door he wasn't in any better state of mind. Staring at his own bicolored eyes in the mirror to make sure they were really working didn't get him anywhere. Neither had pulling at his hair and pacing, his heart hammering a mile a minute.

Because it did happen. He did see something. It was red and vastly powerful, right there front of his face. He had been there and felt the raging armageddon echo in his very bones.

But maybe it really wasn't Aradia?

She always had ghost friends. Pretty weakslime revenge but maybe she had just called up one of them to get back at him?

God, that theory is so full of holes that Sollux hates himself a little for even trying to believe it. He sighs and leaves his respiteblock anyway, taking the stairs up to the roof slowly. His lusus is snoozing away, quiet and peaceful for once, and Sollux envies that a little. When is his own head ever peaceful, nevermind with this new development? He sighs and curls up against the big idiot's knee, leaning against his warm white skin, and settles in. Because he will sit here and stare at the sky forever until maybe he believes that the apocalypse he keeps hearing about in his head isn't coming directly out of her.

That maybe his mind-controlled fuck up won't set that unspeakable horror into motion.


End file.
